The stunning yellow Egyptian alabaster that was among the rare stones exhibited by wholesalers McMarmilloyd at the Natural Stone Show, Wembley, last year has ended up as this bar top in a new restaurant, Bliss, in Bournemouth.

It was the front cover of the May issue of NSS (inset) featuring the back-lit alabaster behind a black cat that helped clinch the deal, says Ian Macdonald, managing director of McMarmilloyd. The restaurant\'s interior designers, Design Mode, saw the picture and have used the translucent stone, lit from underneath in the same way as in the picture, for the bar top at Bliss. The alabaster was worked by Anthony Ives (Masonry) of Poole and the fitters were Tekne, also in Poole.